LANSING – A bill preventing public employers from offering health care benefits to domestic partners is headed to Gov. Rick Snyder after state House members approved the ban in a party line vote on Thursday.

The Republican-led plan was criticized by Democrats who said the the state would be hurt economically, driving residents out and making it difficult for universities and municipalities to attract the best and brightest workers.

But the bill's sponsor, state Rep. David Agema, R-Grandville, said that was “absolutely not” true.

“There are people who are trying to push an agenda on the taxpayers who have already spoken on this issue in 2004,” he said after the 63-45 vote. “This is a matter of law, and it's a matter of cost.”

Agema said the bill is in line with a 2004 state referendum that defined marriage as between a man and woman, and said the state shouldn't spend money on benefits that are opposed by the majority of voters.

State Rep. Thomas McMillin, R-Rochester Hills, said the ban will send money back to state coffers.

“This is money that can be used to put more teachers in the classroom and more police and firefighters on the street,” he said.

But Democrats said state employers will be affected. State Rep. Joan Bauer, D-Lansing, said the ban will discourage people including “top researchers, the best professors and dedicated engineers” from seeking jobs with the state government.

She said such benefits are widely available in the private sector.

“There's a reason these benefits are offered by the business community,” she said. “It makes good business sense. It's short-sighted, and will deny public employers from using all the tools in their tool box to attract the best and brightest to Michigan.”

State Rep. Jeff Irwin, D-Ann Arbor, unsuccessfully tried to have the effects of the bill delayed should it signed by Snyder, saying it would give families time to prepare.”

The House approved the a version of the bill approved by the state Senate on Wednesday. The version removed mention of universities specifically, but Ari Adler, spokesman for House Speaker Jase Bolger, said the school workers are still defined as public employees and therefore covered by the ban.